Gear's Thoughts: What's Your Motivation?

If you’re reading this, you’re probably a highly motivated athlete.  Then again, at some point, we all need help getting out the door to knock out that swim/ride/run we know we need to do.  Compared to the “standard population” of humans though, you’re a “fitness nut”.  What makes you get out for that workout?  What separates fit people from unfit?  Happy people from melancholy?  Winners from losers? 

I’ll claim a huge part of it is simply motivation.  Some people need a lot of motivation, some people need to be told to back off because they are too eager.  In a general sense, it’s rarely a question of knowing what to do.  I know I should choose water instead of soda, veggies instead of fries, a run instead of the couch, but sometimes I don’t.  Frankly, I struggle to stay motivated every day, but there’s one combination that I’ve found is so powerful, it beats every other trick I’ve tried.

Today there are more gizmos, gadgets and gimmicks then ever, and more companies are trying to figure out a secret formula to keep you off the couch.  Technology is certainly playing an increasing role.  Something I find fascinating is the proliferation of data-collection devices for the “general” consumer. Fitbit, Jawbone UP, Zeo and smartphone apps are making it easier than ever to track steps, miles and calories.  The thought is that if you can measure it, you can improve it, and that is the essence of motivation: seeing improvement reinforces good behavior.  Everyone that buys a pedometer already KNOWS that more steps equals “better”; they just need to measure it, and then strive to achieve more.  Data is part one of the secret formula.

Data allows you to measure yourself, but today, it’s also fun to share that information with friends, family and the public.  The Internet is an amazing tool for communication, and sharing our workouts provides great motivation to a lot of people.  Knowing there are others out there watching you and egging you on to stick with a plan and achieve your goals is another way to keep the motivation high.  Being held accountable by your coach or friends gets many people out the door at 5:00 a.m. for that morning spin class at the gym.  It reminds me of a quote from Lou Gerstner’s book, Who Says Elephants Can't Dance? Inside IBM's Historic Turnaround regarding how to get people to do what’s needed.  He said, “People don’t do what you expect, they do what you inspect”.  Did you catch that?  Said another way, if you expect people to simply do what you ask, it often won’t get done, but if you watch them along the way, they’ll do it.  Accountability is the second ingredient to my motivational secret sauce.

There’s one more element to the formula of motivation: events.  Picking an event and putting it on the calendar is a profound motivator.  Recently, I committed to doing the 2013 Miami Marathon.  Just knowing that is on the schedule keeps me excited and scared and helps me to stay motivated.  It’s a stretch goal.  I’ve never run more than five miles at one time in my life.  I’m part scared to death and part super excited.  It’s amazing the effect of saying, “I’m training for a marathon”.  I think about it when I contemplate that ice cream for dessert, when I’m crunched for time but I need to knock out a run, or when dressing up to go for a ride despite the fact that it’s only 40 degrees outside.  Events are the reason, perhaps even the showcase for all that hard training, and they are critical to the formula for staying motivated.

Put together, data, accountability and events are an amazing combination that works together to help me stay motivated.  Sure, I’m preaching to the choir, but take a moment and think about it.  In fact, find a friend and share with them the excitement, thrill and satisfaction of accomplishment that you get when you cross the finish line.  Whether it’s a 5K, century ride or Ironman, there’s simply no better way to stay motivated.  Perhaps that’s why I love it; it’s a lifestyle, there’s no gimmick at all. Just good ol’ fashioned achievement from hard work, and I have it all documented in TrainingPeaks so that I can look back at it for years to come.  

So how does this philosophy translate into what we're doing here at TrainingPeaks?  Well, it's the end goal we keep our eyes on as we continually evolve our product: helping you to better manage the combination of data, accountability and events to produce the results you dream of every night.

When it comes to data, our long-term goal is to ensure that no matter what device you use, you can get the information you've gathered into TrainingPeaks for further analysis. We have multiple developers focused on compatibility with the popular training devices in the market. We’re up to more than 90 different devices, and still hard at work keeping up with the introduction of new devices (they come out seemingly every month). But beyond just collecting the data, we continue to work at finding ways to help you make better sense of it, such as with the three new features we just introduced this week: Elevation Correction, Decoupling and Efficiency Factor (EF).

To help you stay accountable, we offer the biggest network of coaches in the world, with more than 3,000 professionals using our product.  Even if you decide to do it on your own, we offer training plans, meal plans and a VirtualCoach, each of which puts workouts and meals in your email inbox every day to keep you accountable.

Finally, events are tied into the very fabric of TrainingPeaks. VirtualCoach only works when you schedule at least one "A" race, the majority of our training plans are tailored to a particular event, the Performance Management Chart is all about peaking for your key event(s), and even the weeks on your workout calendar start on Mondays, because we know you probably raced over the weekend.

Data, accountability and events are what motivate you. As you can see, they are also what motivate us.  Not only as athletes ourselves, but as a company, where we continue to focus on developing better and better tools to keep you motivated.

Comments

[Faizel]

A nice well written article. I do like the way context is created and carried through.
Data + Accountability + Events = Motivation
I started cycling Oct 2009 and have surprised myself in terms of my consistency and motivation to keep at it. I have started many things (lifestyle changes) in my life (running in 2002, tri in 2003, motorcycling, and surfing to name but a few) and none of them have stayed and growed with me as my cycling has.
What is different, signed up a coach and Training Peaks Oct 2010, started doing cycling races Jan 2010.